Smoked Ham With A Root Beer Brown Sugar Glaze

I have done a free hams on the smoker now, and this one may have turned out to be my best one yet! For this one I used my Masterbuilt Electric Smoker. If you don’t have one, go get one. Very easy to use, very durable, and it makes everything taste awesome!

I didn’t do any pre prep on this ham. No seasoning or rubs, I just took it straight from the wrapper right to to the smoker. I had the smoker pre heated to 225 degrees. I used some Cherry chips. The super nice thing about the Masterbuilt is that they have a cool little slide out drawer to put chips in so you don’t have to open up the smoker to add wood. I put wood chips in about every hour, and I cooked the ham for about 5 hours. A little less than a hour per pound. The goal is to get the temp of the ham to about 160 degrees.

When the ham hits 145/150 degrees, pre heat your oven to 420 degrees. I pulled my ham out of the smoker just shy of 150 degrees since it was going into the oven for a little bit. Also, this is a good time to make your glaze for the ham. Here is what you need for the glaze

1 Cup Root Beer – I like Barq’s

1/2 Cup of Ketchup

1/2 Cup of Brown Sugar

1 Zest of Lemon (Medium to Large)

1 Juice of Lemon (Medium to Large)

2 Tablespoons of Mustard

and my secret ingredient

1 1/2 Teaspoons of Pumpkin Pie Spice

Mix those ingredients together into a sauce pan and let that simmer for about 10 minutes. Once that is set, grab a baking sheet and head out to the smoker and grab your ham! Bring it inside and lightly score the outside skin of your ham. Take a big spoon and start spooning the glaze all over the ham. I use it all. There will be quite a bit of it running off the ham onto the ham. No worries.

Throw that mother into the oven and air 10 minutes! I wouldn’t wait any longer than that. That makes it hot enough for that glaze to glaze over the ham nicely. When you pull it out of the oven, I would slide the ham onto a cutting board to rest for about 30 minutes, and then deal with the pan immediately. At this point, you have a hot pan full of lava hot bubbly sugar. I would get some hot water on it immediately or you will have an unforgiving mess later on.

One of the biggest tips I can give you, and its something I realized recently, is that a sharp knife can make the world of difference when your slicing things. I used dull knives for so long and one day I finally snapped and went and got a couple Wusthoff knives! No regrets! I can cut this stuff super thin! Amazing!

So, get a knife, slice your ham and enjoy! I smoke and grill more than the average person, so keep a eye out as I will post more of my stuff soon. I will be doing a brisket and shrimp on the smoker Christmas Eve so those will be the next up!.

Looks delish! I love Root Beer Glaze on Ham…I might put it in a big aluminum pan, though…no clean up. Dull knives = misery I’m a huge Wustof fan. They hold their edge and the ones I have (others might be different) just fit my hand so nicely and have great balance. They just feel good.